Three-dimensional (3D) scanning and digitization of objects is commonly used in many industries and services and their applications are numerous. A few examples include 3D inspection and measurement of shape conformity in industrial production systems, digitization of clay models for industrial design and styling applications, reverse engineering of existing parts with complex geometry, interactive visualization of objects in multimedia applications, or three-dimensional documentation of artwork and artifacts.
A wide range of techniques exist for acquiring 3D data from an object. These techniques include using structured laser illumination or other controlled stimulus (such as x-rays, ultrasound, or magnetic resonance) to techniques that operate directly on video data captured from one or more cameras. Regardless of the particular sensing technology, a scanning process can be divided into abstract steps of incremental data capture, derivation of 3D data, and registration of the incremental data to a common 3D coordinate system. The final registration step brings the incremental data together into a single 3D model of a scan object.